My Mills and Boons Story

Chapter 1

Prologue

I woke up really early that morning, feeling dazed and disoriented. I was having this evil sense of foreboding, knowing that whatever I was going to recall, from yesterday, was not going to be very pleasant. So as I grappled with the sheets and reached for the lights, I tried to resort to escapism. I see my boring straight black hair framing a fair longish face with big eyes and upturned nose in my mind's eye and grimace. I imagine myself as the Elakshri, the protagonist in my favourite serial. This total heartthrob, Jatin, blessed with a great face and physique and even greater amount of worldly riches, with an MBA degree from a fancy university in the US, was out to woo her. And she, typically, totally unaware, treated him with friendly care and concern.

I was not a huge fan of soap operas until Jatin came. Since then I usually spend at least 2 boring commuting hours everyday wondering how I would have reacted to Jatin's overtures.

After two minutes of imagining him looking down at me and flashing his even whites while vigorously brushing my own, I give up.

As I make coffee, I surrender to the memories of last evening. It started with SAR, my employer's elderly friend asking me out for dinner. I take deep breathes as I remember the amazing Chinese fare....breathe ...in...breathe...out...SAR, with fatherly

concern(or so I thought) asking me how I liked my work ... breathe...in...breathe....out...then with great deliberation telling me that he had a job for me.....in...in...Out...out...a job which included spying on my employers.

           

Chapter 1

Rudin's Law:

In crises that force people to choose among alternative courses of action, most people will choose the worst one possible.

I love the Delhi city .The energy and the single-mindedness of this place is amazing. If you are lucky enough to live in some posh area, there are no nosy marriage-and-studies obsessed aunties or fear of social status to worry about-you can just shut yourself up for days and nobody would care.

To me, a small town-girl who has been brought up by over conscientious, over anxious father, this image of the city life seems like heaven. When my mother died while giving birth to me, my father, thinking that female hands were vital in children's rearing, moved with us to his hometown in Kasauli. There, this amazingly critical bunch of aunts brought us up. They took over completely and it was, to put it very mildly, bizarre. We were given a set of rules to follow unquestioningly. Every time, we tried to resist-we were stopped by reprimands of

"What will people say?" or "What will the neighbours think?" Our every action, every move was to be in accordance with what was supposed as right by the neighbours. I ran off at the age of 16.

Nobody bothered to find me because a runaway teenager, according to them, was worse than a dead teenager. I had brought the family shame and had put them under the spotlight for the wrong reasons, so I was to be punished this way. Not that I cared. I was pretty sure I never wanted to go back there anyway.

But very soon, I realized that finding a job would not be very easy. The call centres had no openings and I had no major degree or qualification to carry me through. It was then that a dream job of a housekeeper presented itself. It was great not because it had been my life's ambition to organize stuff or be bossed about but because everything else truly rocked -the hours were good, the salary was substantial and the tasks were not too demanding-I was to be a sort of overseer-cum-secretary. So I took up residence with a friend and settled in Delhi.

Anyway, its not like I was going to be here forever. I had, in the bus journey from Kasauli to Delhi totally planned for future. I had initially hoped to get a job in some modelling agency or at some thriving call centre at the very least (I had kept myself busy on the journey by having visions of me accepting the crown in the traditional tears-in-the-eyes and hands-on-the-mouth way). But once I realized that that was not going to happen, I settled for becoming the top- professional-in-some-MNC dream.

Accordingly, I finished my schooling at this open school in Delhi and am currently doing B.Comm (Hons) correspondence course from DU. I will start my 3rd and final year in July and then I'll be able to leave the Aryas forever.

The Aryas are my employers. They are one of the richest and the most popular families in the country. The family comprises of 4 members-the elusive father-Abhijit Arya, the business tycoon and the owner of Arya Tech, the largest IT company in India , the very social mother -Krishna Arya, the snobby daughter- Ritu Arya and the son-Virat Arya, about whom I don't know anything at all as he doesn't live with them. From his baby pictures though (apparently, they got squeamish about clicking photos as the kids hit their teens ,a fact for which I, as the person responsible for overseeing the replacement of the frames when it gets too rusty for Mrs Arya's taste ,which is often ,am almost pathetically grateful ),he seems like an unusually serious boy. Almost all day and most of the night, all members of the family are away which suits me just fine.

On my lucky days, I enter at 8 and leave at 5 without seeing anyone and on my worst days, I try to cope up with the high-handed attitude of the daughter and the cold and unfeeling attitude of the mother while she entertains guests. Mr. Abhijit makes no difference with his absent-minded presence.

But with SAR's plans for me, this boring and peaceful existence is going to undergo a huge change, I predict gloomily as I enter the great hall and fulfil the all important clause of taking off my shoes while making sure that none of my body parts touch the wall, as is written in my contract. Due to long years of practice, I am able to manage this without falling, a forte impossible for a first-timer. I quickly glance towards Ritu's room upstairs-door open-means Ritu is out. Smiling slightly, I enter the kitchen.

"You're 3 minutes late, Inaya"